Caesarean Section And Infertility

Posted by Joanna Karpasea-Jones Apr 20, 2008

In the UK, the caesarean section rate is 25% of all childbearing women. In the US, the situation is even worse, with around 36% of babies being born by caesarean. Back in the 1980's, this rate was about 4%, and in a true life threatening emergency, it should never go above 4%.

I have no doubt that caesarean does save lives but these days it is used more and more in non-life threatening situations such as breech presentation which is not a medical emergency. It is possible to give birth vaginally to a breech baby with an experienced midwife or doctor. Increasingly, doctors aren't even trained to deliver these babies, so surgery is all they know.

Women may be a little more questioning if they realised that surgery puts them at risk of uterine rupture during pregnancy, as the womb expands and puts pressure on the scar tissue, as well as low lying placenta which can cause heavy blood loss. That is, assuming they can even get pregnant in the first place. According to Am J Obstet Gynecol.1987 Aug;157 (2): 379-83, 6.4% of women who underwent caesarean developed secondary infertility, compared with only 2.2% of those who had had a vaginal delivery. It was suggested that there may be an infertility threshold in which the added stress of caesarean pushes women with other non-surgical infertility factors over the threshold.